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21 March, 2008

Your body is aging beyond your control because it has been programmed to live out the rules of that collective conditioning. If there is anything natural and inevitable about the aging process, it cannot be known until the chains of our old beliefs are broken. In order to create the experience of ageless body and timeless mind, which is the promise of this book, you must discard ten assumptions about who you are and what the true nature of the mind and body is. These assumptions form the bedrock of our shared worldview.

They are:1. There is an objective world independent of the observer, and our bodies are anaspect of this objective world.

2. The body is composed of clumps of matter separated from one another in time and space.

3. Mind and body are separate and independent from each other.

4. Materialism is primary, consciousness is secondary. In other words, we are physical machines that have learned to think.

5. Human awareness can be completely explained as the product of biochemistry.

6. As individuals, we are disconnected, self-contained entities.

7. Our perception of the world is automatic and gives us an accurate picture of how things really are.

8. Our true nature is totally defined by the body, ego, and personality. We are wisps of memories and desires enclosed in packages of flesh and bones.

9. Time exists as an absolute, and we are captives of that absolute. No one escapes the ravages of time.

10. Suffering is necessary—it is part of reality. We are inevitable victims of sickness, aging, and death.

Each assumption of the old paradigm can be replaced with a more complete and expanded version of the truth. These new assumptions are also just ideas created by the human mind, but they allow us much more freedom and power. They give us the ability to rewrite the program of aging that now directs our cells.

The ten new assumptions are:

1. The physical world, including our bodies, is a response of the observer. We create our bodies as we create the experience of our world.

2. In their essential state, our bodies are composed of energy and information, not sold matter. This energy and information is an outcropping of infinite fields of energy and information spanning the universe.

3. The mined and body are inseparably one. The unity that is “me” separates into two streams of experience. I experience the subjective stream of thoughts, feelings, and desires. I experience the objective stream as my body. At a deeper level, however, the two streams meet at a single creative source. It is from this source that we are meant to live.

4. The biochemistry of the body is a product of awareness. Beliefs, thoughts, and emotions create the chemical reactions that uphold life in every cell. An aging cell is the end product of awareness that has forgotten how to remain new.

5. Perception appears to be automatic, but in fact it is a learned phenomenon. The world you live in, including the experience of your body, is completely dictated by how you learned to perceive it. If you change your perception, you change the experience of your body and your world.

6. Impulses of intelligence create your body in new forms every second. What you are is the sum total of these impulses, and by changing their patterns, you will change.

7. Although each person seems separate and independent, all of us are connected to patterns of intelligence that govern the whole cosmos. Our bodies are part of a universal body, our minds an aspect of a universal mind.

8. Time does not exist as an absolute, but only eternity. Time is quantified eternity, timelessness chopped up into bits and pieces (seconds, hours, days, years) by us. What we call linear time is a reflection of how we perceive change. If we could perceive the changeless, time would cease to exist as we know it. We can learn to start metabolizing non-change, eternity, the absolute. By doing that, we will be ready to create the physiology of immorality.

9. Each of us inhabits a reality lying beyond all change. Deep inside us, unknown to the five-senses, is an inner most core of being, a field of non-change that creates personality, ego, and body. This being is our essential state—it is who we really are.

10. We are not victims of aging, sickness, and death. These are part of the scenery, not the seer, who is immune to any form of change. This seer is the spirit, the expression of eternal being.

These are vast assumptions, the makings of a new reality, yet all are grounded in the discoveries of quantum physics made almost a hundred years ago.

***Source: BOOK ON “AGELESS BODY, TIMELESS MIND” - A PRACTICALALTERNATIVE TO GROWING OLD BY DEEPAK CHOPRA

06 March, 2008

Vedanta an ancient philosophy enunciates the eternal principles of life and living. Living is an art, a skill, a technique. Few have understood it to be so in the span of human history. Nevertheless, you need to learn and practice the technique of living. As you would for playing a musical instrument or flying aircraft.

The world today is unaware of this process of learning. It is not taught in a school or university. Nor in a moral or religious institution. Thus people go through a mechanical way of living merely following a routine of their predecessors. They lack this fundamental knowledge of living. And become victims of stress and strain.

People everywhere have lost the pleasure in action. They try to find peace and happiness by abstaining from action. Hence, everyone looks forward to week end and vacation. Even seeks premature retirement from work. This is a human weakness. Do not fall a prey to it. If you cannot find a peace and happiness in action you can never find it through abstaining.

The world presents two distinct classes of people. One class is active, productive and prosperous. The Western world seems to fit into this category. But by their own admission they have lost their peace of mind. While the other class of people is relatively peaceful and happy but without much action. Since they lack action they are not productive, prosperous. Some of the eastern countries face this problem.

Thus, there is action without peace on one side and peace without action on the other. One wonders if it is possible to combine dynamic action with mental peace. Vedanta provides the answer. The few who have imbibed the knowledge of Vedanta, learnt and practised the technique of living, live a dynamic life of action while enjoying perfect peace and happiness within.

What is Vedanta (Ancient Philosophy)?

Vedanta literally means culmination of knowledge. Veda means knowledge, anta means end. The knowledge of your real Self. The Self within its supreme. Presently obscured by your body, mind and intellect. You are aware of the body, mind and intellect and not your real Self. Vedanta helps you to unfold your Self. Discover the true nature of your inherent Being. Your real Being is divine. He abode of absolute peace and bliss.

Vedanta is a systematic knowledge which explains the meaning and purpose of your existence in the world. A knowledge that is founded on its own authority. It trains you to think for yourself. To analyse, investigate and realize the quintessence of life. Not to submit yourself to blind faith, superstitious belief or mechanical ritual. Ultimately, it leads you to spiritual Enlightenment.

The knowledge of the unknown can be gained only through the use of known factors. Therefore, to unravel the mystery of God you need to use the world of objects and beings known to you. Start with the study of the world, the individual and the relationship between them.

How are you to relate with the world to find peace and harmony? It is not the world that bothers you as you believe it to be. But your relationship with it. You need to learn the principles of right living. Change the character of your action from selfishness to selfless service. Mend the quality of your emotion from preferential attachment to universal love. Raise your knowledge from the mundane to the supreme Self within. Thus you all reach the culmination of human life, the ultimate state of peace and bliss, the goal of religion.

Young men and women ought not to be pestered with Thou shalts and Thou shalt nots. Whatever is forced is never forceful. Dos and don’ts are not designed for human beings. Desire for anything increases with restriction and prohibition. Static precepts, susperstitious beliefs and mechanical rituals are being thrust on people. It frustrates them. Rather, they need to be educated with the knowledge of life and living. The higher values of religion have to be presented systematically and logically to the modern intellect. The philosophy of Vedanta answers the requirements of seekers of truth. The process may take time but is sure to elevate them.